


Diaspora

by Siria



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-21 00:31:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6031576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siria/pseuds/Siria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha and the freedom of the city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Diaspora

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Trin for betaing and Sheafrotherdon for audiencing.

The camera pulled back to show that the broad street was full of people: thousands of them, tens of thousands, stretching away into the blurry distance, waving flags and shouting. In Natasha's experience, that kind of crowd could go either way. This was the festive kind of patriotism, though. The shot changed to a series of close-ups, of mingled Irish and American flags, of phones held aloft, of smiling children hoisted onto their parents' shoulders.

"What a momentous occasion," intoned the TV correspondent, "what a wonderful coming together of nations, as we look here at the heart of Dublin city, just _full_ of people who've come to celebrate this honour."

Natasha ate another heaped spoonful of Lucky Charms, and then swiped with her thumb at the trickle of milk that ran down her chin.

"Congratulations," Stark said, flopping down beside her on the sectional, "sarcastic cereal eating, yet another skill you've mastered, Romanov, I'm in awe here."

"Shh," Pepper hissed from across the room, "I can't hear what they're saying!"

"Oh come on, it's not like anyone's going to be winning a Pulitzer for reporting on this," Stark said, "Blah blah, yay Team USA, blah blah, begosh a shamrock," but shut up when Clint hurled a cushion at him from the other side of the living room and beaned him right on the head. 

The scene on the television screen changed once more to show the view from a helicopter. A large stage had been set up in front of Trinity College flanked by huge monitors, letting the people further back on the street get a view of what was going on. Right now, a group was performing, something staid on harp and violin. Natasha amused herself by counting how many sniper positions she could see from just this one vantage point—apparently the architecture of Dublin city centre hadn't changed much since the last time she'd had a job there.

"The Freedom of the City of Dublin carries with it some ancient rights and privileges," continued the correspondent. "From today, Captain Rogers will no longer have to pay local taxes on goods he carries through the city gates for the purposes of trade, and, very exciting, he will be able to graze as many sheep as he wants to right here on College Green."

"Not that he could get many sheep in here today, Thomas! This place is packed," chirped the female correspondent. 

"Right you are, Rachel," intoned the male correspondent. "The Irish police force estimates that there are some 40,000 people here today, after all, but maybe there is, as they say, room for a little one."

"Lies, damn lies, and misinformation," Stark said, pointing at the screen, "did they think that skimming the Wikipedia entry was all the prep needed for this? Because—"

"Tony," Pepper said through gritted teeth.

Natasha ate another spoonful of cereal.

"What! Just because they can't be bothered to do proper research, that hasn't been a thing in decades, I am going to Tweet about this—"

"You promised you'd never go near Twitter again after the Betty White incident—"

"Those photos were misinterpreted and taken out of context—"

"I have enough arrows to shoot everyone," Clint said evenly. "Shush."

Everyone was quiet for a moment, and watched while the female correspondent interviewed a young man in a sweater emblazoned with the American flag. The text on the bottom of the screen proclaimed "Network Exclusive: Interview with Captain America's Fourth Cousin."

"This is like being in one of the circles of hell," Stark said, but quieter this time, out of one corner of his mouth. "Probably a little bit of the fifth, maybe with hopes of the seventh. At least I think it's the seventh—am I thinking of the right one? Rhodey would know because he did the reading in that Italian Lit class but is he here? He is not here! Why does Rhodey get to skip out on 'supporting Steve' and 'showing that we're proud he's being honoured like this'?"

"First," Pepper said, "I don't sound like that, my voice has never done anything like that, and second, Rhodey isn't here because he is a contributing member of society with a job, and responsibilities, and—"

"Shh!" Clint said. "They're interviewing another cousin, I want to hear!"

There was now a middle-aged woman onscreen, apparently Steve's second cousin once removed, who was brandishing a lace tablecloth which she claimed had once belonged to Steve's grandmother. The woman's name was Concepta, and she had the thickest Dublin accent Natasha had ever heard.

"History," Stark intoned. 

Natasha tilted her bowl so that she could slurp the last of the milk from the bottom. It was teeth-achingly, artificially sweet, and she drained every last drop of it before setting the bowl and spoon down on the coffee table. 

The music changed, from harp and violin bounced along a city street through dozens of speakers, to what sounded like a tinny pre-recorded rendition of the Irish national anthem. That was soon drowned out by a great roar from the crowd as a group of dignitaries walked on stage, led by Steve—stiffly resplendent in his full military regalia—and an elderly man with a shock of white hair. 

"Oh my god," Pepper said, "is that the Irish president? He's _adorable_."

"He's tiny," Clint said. "He could ride around on Cap's shoulder like a parrot."

"A chairde," said the tiny president in a tiny, high-pitched voice, "táim fíor bródúil as fáilte a chur roimh an Chaptaen Mac Ruaidhrí inniu ar son daoine na hÉireann." Even with the benefit of the microphone, he was barely audible over the crowd's cheers.

"I have no idea what any of that means," Pepper said, clasping her hands, "but it sounds wonderful."

The president quickly switched to English and proceeded to introduce the sizeable number of dignitaries who, it seemed, were necessary to confer on Steve the duty to defend the city of Dublin with a sword and longbow whenever he was called upon to do so. Somewhere in the cluster of people on stage, Natasha thought she caught sight of one of the many distant cousins who'd come forward to claim ties to Steve in the past few months. Steve stood head and shoulders above most of them, and though he was smiling, it was obvious to Natasha that he was deeply uncomfortable. That was the smile he broke out when trying to convince you to buy war bonds. 

By now, the lord mayor was speaking: Captain Steven Rogers was a true son of the city and a great hero, and the people of Dublin were proud to welcome this child of the Irish diaspora back to his ancestral home. From the other end of the sofa, Stark hooted loudly. Natasha wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that when Steve got back to Brooklyn, it would be to find a banner emblazoned with 'True Son of the City' strung up in his living room. 

"Oh look," Pepper said, "he gets a scroll! That calligraphy is beautiful, we should get him a proper frame for that. Oh, and a sculpture."

"We are informed," said the male TV correspondent, "that this is a piece of genuine, custom-crafted Waterford Crystal now being presented to Captain Rogers. How magnificent."

"Looks like tentacles," Clint said with every sign of deep appreciation. "Kinky."

There were more speeches, and rounds of applause, and, as the sun set over Dublin, a reasonably extravagant fireworks display. Natasha kind of liked the explosion of red, white, and blue that, for a few seconds, had Steve's shield suspended in light over the city. Then it was all over, and all the dignitaries were herded off the stage—to attend a banquet at the Mansion House, the female correspondent said. 

"Well, that was _lovely_ ," Pepper said, standing, "I'm so pleased for him. Does anyone want tea? I think I'll make some Irish breakfast tea, in honour of the occasion."

Stark shook his head, Natasha said, "Sure," and Clint wandered off towards the kitchen in Pepper's wake, saying that he thought it was burrito o'clock. The TV coverage switched to an ad break; a baritone voice asked Natasha if she'd considered what a reverse mortgage could do for her.

"You know, it has occurred to me," Stark said. 

Natasha shot him a look out of the corner of her eye. The pause after his words was a significant one, and Stark was staring at her. She wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of asking, though. Give Stark an inch and he'd take a lot more than a mile. She looked back at the TV, which was now trying to sell her factory-direct flooring. 

"For a hundred-year-old, orphaned only child, Cap has one hell of a lot of family floating around."

"Uh huh," Natasha said flatly.

"Like, almost as soon as the government confirmed he'd been thawed out," Stark pressed on, "there were cousins and fraudulent great-great-great-nieces and whatevers-thrice-removed crawling out of the woodwork. Bam, all over the place." He snapped his fingers. "Pretty much the only thing we haven't had is his illegitimate love child and that's only because everyone knows he was too busy starching his underwear during the war to get any action. But anyone who's got one per cent of their DNA in common with Cap, they're out trying to turn that into a career in reality TV."

"Capitalism," Natasha said, "it's a hell of a drug."

"Exactly," Stark said, "it is, though personally I was always fonder of the drugs capitalism could buy you, oh my misspent youth. No one ever went broke underestimating people's basic greed, is what I'm saying. Which got me to wondering…"

Natasha rolled her eyes and looked over at him, arching a brow and daring him to just get to the point.

"No one claimed you," Stark said, his words carefully enunciated. "All those SHIELD files you dumped online, all those names and ranks and serial numbers, but not one person shows up from dear old Mother Russia and tries to make bank on their relationship to long-lost cousin Nat?"

Natasha turned away, looking back at the TV screen. She had no idea what it showed just then; all her attention was focused on keeping her breathing level and steady. "What," she said, trying to force some levity into her tone, "you're disappointed they didn't give me the Freedom of Moscow? I'm touched."

"No, I'm saying I got curious and did some digging," Stark said. "And I didn't find anyone."

Natasha hitched a shoulder. "I was an only child too, and it was the late eighties. Perestroika was more important than keeping records, the KGB was—"

"Nuh uh, I mean I didn't find _anyone_ ," Stark interrupted her. "I didn't find _you_. FRIDAY thought she turned up traces, but she must have been mistaken. Because they were all very, very old references and you were born in 1984 so they couldn't be you. Right?"

Natasha looked back over at him. Stark was wearing a bleach-stained Iron Maiden t-shirt and his gaze was steady and direct and he was, after all, frighteningly intelligent. "Right."

"But Natalia Alianovna Romanova, she was born in 1984."

Stark's phrasing was as scalpel-precise as Nick Fury's, and Nick had never had to ask her about any of it. Long before Clint had brought her in from the cold, Nick had known all about her scattered, scarred sisters. He'd known her name. 

On the TV, the ad break had ended, and the reporters were once more interviewing people in the crowd. Night had fallen on the other side of the Atlantic, and while the crowd was thinning out a little—families with young children starting to head home—it seemed that many intended to stay put and celebrate. Natasha blinked, trying to imagine Red Square full of people celebrating her return to the land where her parents and her parents' parents had been born. It made her stomach roil, acid and queasy. There were reasons why Russia might want her back, reasons why she might go back. None of them were good. 

"I take the Groucho Marx approach," Natasha said after a moment's silence. 

It was Stark's turn to raise his eyebrows. 

"Why would I want to belong to any country that would have me?" she asked, and stood, and picked up her bowl, and left the room. On the TV behind her, the crowd cheered.


End file.
